We are neither fire nor water, we are human
by vieFawn
Summary: Basically, what should have happened at the end of 3x04. Clarke asks Lexa to stay, and asks her to tell her about Costia. Lexa recounts from day one. One shot.


**(UPDATED) Author's note:**

 **So now that 3x07 happened, I have a lot of feelings. I'm probably gonna write a bunch of fics and/or cry into my dogs fur. Either way..**

 **P.S – Sorry if it's not great, I wrote it in one sitting off the top of my head, had no outline and just went with whatever!**

 **Set at the end of 3x04.**

 **xx Fawn (my tumblr username is vieFawn, if you want to talk about Clexa please do so!)**

* * *

"Lexa, wait."

She pauses at the door, the flowing silk of her gown settles around her ankles. Clarke forces her gaze to meet Lexa's. A ghost of a smile is painted on Lexa's lips, something unfamiliar, but something that belongs. The boundary she has painted, with harsh words and insecurity, to block everyone and everything out, is rigid and stuck. It is made from the strongest metal, barbed wires curled around the forefront of Lexa's mind, its' shine reflected in her eyes.

 _Her people. She does it all for her people._

Clarke's suffering is boundless and possibly neverending, reflected in the water. A black mass of nothing, swirling her around and around. She cannot scream or the water will fill her lungs, and she can not see the past clearly, water blurs her vision. It kills her slowly, and she thinks she deserves it.

But Clarke is like the water she drowns in. She is wild, and she takes no notice of the objects that block her path. Water never fights, it just keeps flowing. And so does Clarke. She seeps through Lexa's boundaries, the cool drops seeking shelter in the deepest part of Lexa's mind. She infiltrates Lexa's stronghold, and Lexa is rendered helpless. Clarke does not break down her guard, for if she did, Lexa would no longer be an efficient commander. But she lets herself pass through the walls, the fence, until she is the only thing in Lexa's mind.

"Yes, Clarke?"

"Tell me about Costia."

Lexa's grip on the door tightens. Lexa is fire, quiet and deadly. Present in the form of large, damaging bursts of flame, or small gifts of light. She brightens the darkness, but can destroy the day. She feels it, a small flame in her heart, at the mention of _that_ name. It is not a fire of passion, it is a fire that burns and gnaws at Lexa's heart, like a fire that is vanquished and then revived at the worst of times.

"What do you want to know?"

Clarke blinks. She has not thought much of Costia. Her thoughts are occupied about survival. About impending war, and the lives that will be taken, as well as the lives that already have been. But the Ice Queen, immortalised forever with a spear through her heart, fills Clarke's brain. In Clarke's daydreams, the Ice Queen not only bleeds for herself, but for the long lost ghost of a girl that once was Lexa's.

Queen Nia's death signified a possible end to an oncoming war, but also as personal closure, for the one who actively avoids to seek unnecessary death. Clarke wonders just how many people know if the heart-stopping moment was just _so much more_ for their commander. And she wonders just how long revenge, _blood must have blood,_ has lingered in Lexa's mind for one particular set of spilt blood.

And so Clarke wants to know. She just _has to know._ She wants Lexa to confide in her, so she can know Lexa as something other than the leader who does right by her people. She wants an individual, she knows she has barely scratched the surface. She _just knows.  
_  
"Anything," Clarke breathes. She thinks Lexa will refuse at first, if her white knuckles and hollow cheeks are anything to go by. But there are gaps, metals twisted into certain shapes, in Lexa's guard. And Clarke seeps in, like water past rocks.

She comes back, and Clarke is aware of a newfound distance between them. She can't place it, exactly, but it feels like Lexa is grabbing her by the throat with one hand, and caressing her with the other. The other girl sits tentatively on the other side of the bed, and Clarke's reaction is to push her away with one hand, and to use her other hand to draw her in closer.

But neither need to physically move to sense the others' discomfort. Lexa's eyes are no longer gentle, there's a fierceness to them as she delves back into her past, and Clarke's lips no longer tug up at the corners, as if they had invisible strings jerking them up at Lexa's embarassed smile, the image still imprinted somewhere in Clarke's mind.

"We met when we were five," Lexa begins, and Clarke shuts her eyes as Lexa begins her story.

* * *

Lexa's formal training begun on her fifth birthday. Her initiation had gone smoothly. The cut that Anya's sharp knife had sliced through her left palm still stung, but she prides herself in remembering the black blood that dripped onto Anya's smooth skin, trickling down her arm until it splattered onto the ground.

Lexa is one with the Earth, one with the people. _Her_ people. Maybe. Someday. Sometimes she got a little ahead of herself.

She is a serious little child. Sturdy on her feet. She has been hitting sticks against everything since she could walk. Dirt was always plastered over her face, and she would initiate a pretend war with anyone that would indulge her with their attention. She would pretend the rocks behind her were her helpless people.

She, Lexa, would save them.

She will now be living and training in Polis, in the giant tower that, to Lexa, looks like it towers over the entire world. Her parents are so proud of her. She is a Nightblood, both blessed and cursed with the pitch black liquid that runs through her veins. She is special, she is told, perhaps one day she will lead their people to great victory. She takes this information very seriously. So with enough kisses from her loved ones to last a lifetime, she is transported by horse to the big city. She has been here once before, but she barely remembers it. The large buildings, especially the large towers, awes her, and she smiles giddily, imagining all that will come.

Her first day of training excites Lexa so much that she feels like running for miles and miles beforehand. She is almost insufferable while she sits in a room, filled with long tables, occupied by Nightbloods, same as her. She wiggles and wiggles in her seat and she tries to stop herself by sitting on her tiny hands. A man stops by and smiles at her, this enthusiastic, tiny child. He tells her that his name is Gustus, and he looks at her so sincerely that Lexa feels safe under his care.

Anya commands her first day of training. She is always serious with her training. These kids, a special bunch that had been chosen by fate or by chance, had to be prepared. The looming gaze of the twelve clans are always on her shoulders, and she must train these kids to prepare for that.

Their childhood was destined to take a different approach, a more intensive one, than those kids whose blood ran red. But even she wants to smile as the new initiate sidles up to join the group. A young girl from Trikru, whose hair is so long and curly that it is always pinned behind her in tight braids. Her little face is so serious, but Anya can see the fire that brightens up her eyes. A passion for a fight that Anya wishes she would never have to face.

She welcomes the girl, _Lexa,_ to the group and allows everyone else to introduce themselves. She encourages partnerships between the kids, but not so much friendship. There are always sacrifices in this world, and one of those were close relationships. These kids were to have no ties to each other, or to anyone else. It was a lonely life, but, she thinks, one made of strength and good will.

For Lexa, the day goes by much too quickly. She is unskilled, but she is fast and a quick thinker. She is hit a lot, by specially carved sticks as thick as swords, but she remains on her feet. She is sturdy, and determined. This impresses Anya, she sees past the injuries, the way the girl can't seem to win, and absorbs her determination, her inner strength.

The children switch partners every time one falls to the ground or concedes defeat. Lexa is small, and Anya smiles as she realises she has yet to admit defeat.

Until her partner switches with a girl roughly a little taller than her. She looks familiar, eyebrows pulled taut in either annoyance or a fierce determination to win, and eyes the same colour of the trees that Lexa used to climb outside camp. Her skin is tan, burnt brown, as if she had spent much too time in the summer sun and never any time inside her tent, and her hair is the opposite of Lexa's. Straight and light and airy. She is built differently to the other kids, too. Where the other kids were thin, they all had a slight muscle definition to them. This girl had no muscle, she was so scrawny, just a pile of stick-thin limbs stuck together and rendered good-to-go.

It's all this that makes Lexa stare at her for a bit longer, and the next thing she knows, her bottom is on the hard ground and there is no air left in her lungs. She looks at Anya, worried, but Anya shows no expression. Lexa leaps back up.

"Rematch." She almost growls. She gets her stick at the ready. It is still a little heavy for her, but she doesn't care. It's sheer willpower that allows her to use it, and it is willpower that will knock this other girl, who has now raised her eyebrow a little cockily, to the ground.

"You want another round where you'll end up on the ground?" The other girl crosses her eyes at Lexa in a taunt. "Fine, round two."

"There will be no rou-" Anya begins, but Lexa has already lunged for the other girl, who moves lightly out of the way. The other girl grins, it is feral and Lexa wants so badly to put her in her place. She envisions the other girl on the ground, Lexa standing over her, victorious. Anya smiling proudly at her in the background, and then-

She feels a rough hand pull her back and she almost yelps in surprise.

"I appreciate your determination." It is Anya. "But I do not appreciate you going against orders. Never do anything in your training that I do not instruct. Got that, new girl?"

Lexa's cheeks go red at the scolding, but the other kids do not even react, they just continue with their own training. The other girl skips lightly back to the spot where she had been sitting, falling easily to the ground in a cross-legged position. The smile has been wiped off her face, and she looks at Lexa for a few seconds before she looks away.

Anya concludes the training, and the kids retire to the lower floor of the large tower that Lexa had so admired. Her room is tiny, just a small rectangular with a bed and a small wash pan. The kids are separated by a heavy fabric that is not see-through, tapered to the ground. It is lonely, unlike the tent that her parents and her shared, and she cannot help the homesickness that overwhelms her. It clutches at her heart, and she tries, unsuccessfully, to not let the tears spill.

 _Crying is weak._ She scolds herself. But even telling herself this over and over does not stop the incredible sadness that has taken over her.

So she thinks that she is so sad she must be imagining things when a head pops up underneath the heavy material. The face that peers at her is tan, and bright, and familiar. It's the girl from before, and Lexa's sadness is replaced with embarassment. First this girl knocks her to the ground on her first day, and here she is to witness Lexa crying.

Could this day get worse?

But the cocky smile that was on the girls face earlier that day is gone, and she looks at Lexa, her lips twisting into a look of concern. "The first night is always hard," the other girl announces, as she uses her arms to drag herself into Lexa's room, the fabric dragging to slowly reveal the girls whole body. "But it gets better."

All Lexa can do is sniff. The girl pushes herself to her feet and sticks out her hand.

"I'm Costia."

Lexa wipes her nose with her wrist and shakes the other girls hand. She doesn't care if the other girl gets dirty from it, Lexa's not sure she isn't going to make fun of her yet anyway.

"Lexa."

"Wecksa?" the girl says. Lexa sniffs again and clears her throat.

"It's Lexa."

"Oh," Costia pauses. Her hair is brown at the ends, and lighter at the top, as if she had parts of the sun trapped in her hair. "That's a pretty name."

"You have pretty hair," Lexa offers back. The other girl smiles at her, and Lexa relaxes, sure that a smile that genuine could not have menacing consequences behind it.

The girl sits in her bed and splays out. She is all tangly limbs and arms and elbows and her hair sprinkles over Lexa's bedsheets as if she were trying to take up every single bit of spare space. Lexa doesn't say anything about this stranger on her bed.

"I think you'll like it here," Costia says, scrunching up her nose thoughtfully.

"I enjoyed today," Lexa dips her head. _Before you knocked me to the ground._

"Fighting is okay, I guess."

"Okay?" Lexa echoes. "I love fighting, and winning."

Costia rolls over onto her stomach and looks at Lexa. "I don't think it's all about winning. Isn't it better we stay alive?"

Lexa has never thought about anything other than winning since she was two and protecting her fake rock people with wooden sticks.

So she shrugs.

* * *

They're twelve when Lexa thinks that she loves her.

She loves the way that Costia's nose scrunches up before she says something smart, the way that she still sneaks into Lexa's room and they giggle about silly things early into the mornings, the way that Costia's hair has become lighter and her skin has become darker because she refuses to ever be inside except at night. She loves how Costia was patient and giggly when it came to teaching Lexa how to swim, how she tried not to laugh _every_ time Lexa sunk under and Costia had to dive in and pull Lexa back to safety by her underarms.

And she loves that even though Costia is a fierce fighter, still one of the best in her light and agile ways, that she stills tries to instill peace in everybody. Lexa loves the stories Costia tells her about how if Costia becomes _Heda,_ how she will try to unite the clans.

"Surely there's a bigger threat, somewhere?" Nose all scrunched up, cheeks all pink. "I think we should all work together, as one. So many people die, for nothing."

"People die for their people," Lexa tells her. It is something she knows at the very core of her person. "Sacrifices must be made. _Blood must have blood."_

"But imagine if nobody had to die. What if we could talk it all out?"

"That's not how we work, Costia."

"I wish it would be."

* * *

They're thirteen, and Costia holds Lexa as she cries into her shoulder. The sun is rising and none of them have slept. Lexa's not sure how she can sleep again after knowing her parents no longer walk the Earth.

"You will always have your parents," Costia whispers in her ear as she clutches Lexa so tightly against her chest she thinks that she may burst. "Even if they are gone."

* * *

They're fifteen, and Anya has split them into two sides. It is meant to resemble a game. Costia and Lexa are on opposite sides. Lexa's side wins when Lexa's sword hovers above Costia's heart.

Costia doesn't say anything.

She's late to sneak into Lexa's bedroom that night. Lexa doesn't think too much of it. She's brimming with Anya's praise and the cheers of her team.

Costia doesn't say anything until she's up on Lexa's bed, her legs curled underneath her.

"Would you sacrifice me if you had too?" Her voice is different, lower. She's serious. Gone are the laugh lines around her mouth. The question doesn't catch Lexa entirely off guard. It's something that they had to think about once she realised what becoming Heda truly means.

 _Do anything for your people. Anything._

And she thought with her parents gone, that it would be easy to sacrifice anyone she knew for the greater good. But she turns to look at Costia, her own face covered in seriousness. The training not only changes them physically, but mentally. She is not meant to feel. The emotons that sit at the heart and soul of every decision a person makes, are banished into nothing. But Costia always makes her feel. Every time Lexa thinks she has herself under control, Costia brings it all back to the surface. And Lexa thinks that's okay, for now. The emotions Costia switches on allows Lexa to seek both pleasure and pain. Pain in the battlefield, and pleasurable are the nights she stays up with Costia, talking about everything and nothing at the same time.

"We are told to do anything for our people."

"So that is a yes?"

"I will not have too," Lexa says. She reaches out to touch Costia's cheek, just for reassurance, but Costia turns her head.

"Costia, you must not be offended. That is how we are trained. As Commander, we must be willing to do anything to protect our people. I am not saying that I would sacrifice you in place of our people, but I also thought that you would know to do that yourself."

"The choices we make define the people we become."

"I wish to be a good leader, if I am given the opportunity," Lexa says quietly. "I thought you wished for the same."

"I understand. Good night, _Commander."_ There's a sarcastic edge to Costia's voice that Lexa does not expect. She blinks in surprise.

Before she completely disappears under the curtain, Costia turns to look at her. She stares at Lexa, green eyes meeting green, before she is completely gone from Lexa's view.

Lexa does not understand the look Costia just gave her, but she will, eventually. And by then it will be too late.

Gone will be the etchings on her bones of Costia's words, the etchings on the white surfaces that have become a part of her.

And Lexa will have to live with that for the rest of her life.

* * *

It's the next day and training is over. Costia does not roam the streets of Polis with Lexa, tasting different delicacies as is normally their tradition at the end of a weeks training. She hovers by the rocks on which they had just stood, alone, until Zarron, a seventeen year old Nightblood from the Ice Nation, appears.

"What are you doing here?" he asks. He kicks a rock with his metal boot. Costia watches it fly through the air until it hits the ground again, and then she replies.

"Nothing."

He comes closer, and closer, and Costia stops remembering to count the seconds. His mouth is on hers and suddenly his legs are between hers and she's forced to lean back against the rock, and she tries to scream _Stop_ but her voicebox just won't make the sound and her lips won't let the words come to life.

But she's always been lithe, and nimble, and she manages to slip out underneath him after a hefty kick in the stomach of which he clearly was not expecting. She tries to dart away but he grabs her arm, yanking her back. She knows she is done for, when a gruff voice asks,

"What are you doing?"

It is Titus. He is always with Anya, but now, he is alone. He is collecting a sword left behind from training, and Costia wants to hug him and hug him because she knows if not for his presence she would have certainly lost this fight.

With no air in her lungs, she runs for Lexa. She runs and she runs and she runs.

And all through the night Lexa holds her.

Lexa also realises that she is most certainly in love with her.

* * *

They're sixteen, and Lexa thinks Costia is like the river she taught her to swim in. She is all cool and collected, and nothing stands in her way. She bypasses difficulties with ease, and she fills the cavern of Lexa's mind with happiness. A water filling up an unfeeling space. Lexa's internal fire has not yet forged iron bars, guarding her from emotions that threaten to cloud her decisions, and so she lets Costia do what she does best.

Lexa doesn't know it, but sometimes Costia drowns in the waters that Lexa so easily compares her too.

They're out in the woods. Lexa is brandishing a large stick, and Costia too. Wood hits wood as the two of them dance around the forest. Costia's stick comes down on Lexa, and she squeals with laughter when Lexa's sword snaps.

"Not so brave without your weapon, are you?" Costia crows. Lexa frowns. She is almost undefeatable in combat. Her exception is always Costia.

Though Lexa is without a weapon, Costia leans in, forcing her stick down against Lexa until Lexa is helpless on her back. She playfully holds the stick against Lexa's throat and begins to count, "1..2…"

Then Costia is on her back, Lexa's feet kicking at Costia's ankles until they had given way. She clambers on top of Costia and smirks. "I don't need a sword to win," she says. She forces the stick out of Costia's hands and recieves a pout in return. "Neither should you."

Then they flip, Costia grabbing Lexa's wrists and forcing her underneath her.

"I do not need a sword either." But her words are no longer playful and though her eyes still crinkle, her face is serious. She straddles Lexa, knees pressed in against her waist. Then they are chest to chest, and Costia's lips are on Lexa, and Lexa's tongue is suddenly in her mouth, and neither of them know how long they are out there for, but soon it is dark.

They run back to the tower, their hands never let go of the others.

Back in their room they make love. And Lexa looks at Costia, full of light and love and hope and peace, and _strength._ And she thinks she knows in that moment that nothing could ever touch them.

* * *

They're seventeen and out in the forest. Costia's lips are on hers, her back is pressed up against an old Oak tree. Lexa thinks she'll never get over how good this feels. Nothing could compete.

Then the ground rustles behind them, and when Lexa turns around to look, she sees Zarron. She stands up, ready to defend them. She hates him, hates this boy, for what he has done to Costia. But he just stares at them, his eyes flickering between them, and then he leaves. He does not say anything to Anya that night.

But Lexa does not see the smirk on his face as he had turned to leave.

* * *

They're eighteen, and sobbing into each other. Anya's death has destroyed their world. Then it all happens at once. Lexa will be Commander, among congratulations and people begging for things to change, she still finds the time to love Costia.

 _Her spirit walks with you now._

Her initiation ceremony will be in Polis, the two of them are currently in Trikru. Indra can see Lexa looks for Costia everywhere she goes, and she fears that this will be the Commander's downfall. She loves them both and she must keep them out of harms way. They are better separated, and alive.  
She keeps Costia back, forbidding her to go to Lexa's ceremony. So the two say goodbye, they hug, and Costia kisses Lexa gently on the cheek.

"I love you," she says, her lips so close to Lexa's ear so that nobody else could possibly hear.

It is the last thing that Costia will ever say to Lexa, it is the last time that she will ever smile at her. It is the last time that they will ever touch. Costia's smile is impossibly happy and sad at the same time, as if something not of this world has told her that this may be goodbye. It is Lexa's first real experience of someone being entirely truthful, no catches, no ifs, no buts, yet no words had to be spoken. Their love is pure, but fleeting. One that could never last.

Not in this world, not at this time.

Surely Lexa had to know.

But she does not. So she smiles back at Costia. It is not a smile that is impossibly happy and sad at the same time. It's a smile from a person that is assured that they will be there tomorrow, and that all is well now.

Lexa will always wish that she had known.

* * *

The next day Indra listens to Costia beg and plead and whine, so she allows Costia to go. Perhaps Costia and Lexa will do better together than apart, she decides.

Perhaps with Lexa, so different from the Commanders before her, will do better in love, as she will understand the intricities that unite and bond people together. As long as she understands that sacrifices may have to be made.

So Costia sets off on horseback. She doesn't get far at all because four Ice Nation guards rip her off her horse. There is no way she can fight them. Perhaps she should have focused more on training than peace. It's her last thought before it all goes black.

She wakes up tied to a chair. Her head aches and she watches black blood drip to the floor. Queen Nia is in front of her. _A little birdie told me,_ she begins. She talks and talks and suddenly Costia registers what she is saying. She frowns and shakes her head, but still, she thinks desperately of all of Lexa's secrets, all the plans she has that she wishes to put in place when she is Commander. But she never speaks them, oh no.

Queen Nia would use Lexa's secrets against her. She wouldn't just throw Lexa off the throne, she would kill her too. Eradicate the need for future competition if Lexa so decided to step up again. Lexa as Commander was her rightful place. Costia, somewhere, had always known that deep down.

"Lexa would sacrifice you if it meant saving two of her people. That's the greater good, isn't it? Sacrifice one life, and save two," Queen Nia sneers at her. Costia blinks. Surely she's more than that to Lexa, just a life? Lexa is everything to her, a black mass that absorbed everything in its path, infinity in a person. Lexa was her love, and she, Lexa's.

Her mouth remains shut.

But she remembers when they're fifteen, and perhaps Queen Nia is right. But surely, _kisses against trees, hands pressed against hot skin,_ that changed things since then? Surely Lexa wouldn't abandon her now. Lexa always used to tell her fairytales, and the hero would always be saved at the last moment.

 _Am I a hero, though?_

Maybe if she waited it out, someone would come for her.

"Somethng you must understand, Costia." Queen Nia says as she paces the room. Her right-hand man holds a club in his arms. "Is that I would save a lot more people than Lexa ever could, I could stop a lot of bloodshed, if my own Nightblood could become Commander, if I could get Lexa to step down, more people would live, can't you see?"

But Costia already sees all she needs too. She doesn't believe Queen Nia, her face betrays her, her emotions show the enemy this. And Queen Nia is furious. She grabs her chair, rattles it until the wound from Costia's head seeps out more blood. Costia can feel it against her neck, but she won't cry out.

She's already accepted that nobody is here to save her.

* * *

Costia is beaten black and bloody and she is amazed she is still alive. Knives and clubs have been tearing at Costia's skin for hours, and there is a thin layer of blood that now separates her and her chair. It leaks all around her. Black as night. Blood that made her life better, and then betrayed her.

Queen Nia's last ditch plan is to force Lexa to choose between her position and Costia. They will leave in the morning. Costia loves Lexa with everything she is made out of, and she hopes that Lexa loves her like that too. But a part of her knows that Lexa has always sought for the greater good. To protect her people. Queen Nia advising the Commander on what to do if Lexa were to concede defeat, would be condemning the rest of her people to a life of death.

Costia doesn't think she could take the pain, watching Lexa choose her people over her, no matter how much Costia knows it is the right thing to do.

And fate, if there is such a thing, one that has given her gifts and then taken them away in different forms, comes along. It is a man, tough and rigid, he is talking to the guard positioned outside her door. He sees her, and he is surprised. He doesn't know she is there.

He comes in, and the guard stops him, but he says something to the guard and the guard relents.

"Who are you?"

"My name is Costia. I am from Trikru."

"And why are you here?"

"The Queen Nia wishes to use me against Lexa." She always tells the truth. The man looks at her, a defiant, half-dead young girl. Sometimes he really hates his mother.

They stare at each other for a moment. Costia's gaze never falters, and neither does the man's. She sees it in his face. He is distraught. He is sorry.

"if I free you, my mother will certainly have my head."

Ah, Roan. The Prince of Azgeda. Costia had heard of him. The Ice Nation Nightbloods would always giggle at him. She sees it, he is handsome amongst other men. She knows that they both know how to solve this, but neither is willing to say it.

But day is about to break and Costia is running out of time. Costia has secretly always feared death. Lexa says their spirits will meet in every life. Costia is not so sure. She knows that she can choose to live, and see Lexa again. But she will see Lexa choosing other people over her.

She can choose to die, and hold the bittersweet memories that Lexa has given her in her last moments. Perhaps Lexa will be right. Perhaps, in another life, their spirits will make their way back to each other.

"Cut off my head, instead. Spare me my pain and suffering. Kill the guard, and nobody will know."

So then Costia feels Roan's cold blade against her neck, and she remembers.

She remembers seeing Lexa, a five year old, dirt streaked down her face. Determination in green eyes. Her bottom on the forest floor as Costia swipes her legs out under her. A tear-streaked face on a hard bed, all alone.

But never alone again with Costia around. She sees _Tera,_ a fox caught in a trap that they freed and secretly nursed back to health. She holds Lexa's hand shyly as they watch their newfound friend scamper away, back into the abyss of the forest.

She sees Lexa's lips, warm, smiling. She sees her become Anya's second, Lexa kisses her, she kisses Lexa, hot skin against hot skin, legs and legs intertwined, hands holding onto each other for dear life as if they ever let go they would be apart forever.

The last thing she sees is Lexa's face. All sharp cheekbones and smiling eyes and her lips, pink and upturned, telling Costia that she loves her.

 _I love you too._

Now, Costia will never feel anything ever again.

* * *

The guard outside Costia's door hears Costia telling Roan to kill him. He flees because he is most certainly terrified by the concept of death. He runs right into Queen Nia. In hopes for his own protection, he tells Queen Nia that her precious son has beheaded the prisoner.

Queen Nia is furious. She curses and curses at her son until she runs out of breath. In a hazy moment of vengeance, with intentions filled with spite, hate, and greediness, she boxes Costia's head and sends the guard to deliver it right to Lexa's door.

He does. He has no other choice. It's a death sentence. In hopes for his life to be spared, he tells Lexa about Costia's capture, her torture, and death. He says he had nothing to do with it. That he is just the messenger. _So don't kill me._

He leaves out the part that Roan killed her mercifully, or that the outcome if Costia had lived would be much worse than death for the both of them.

A peace treaty is signed between the twelve clans. It takes all of Lexa's strength to stare Queen Nia down. Costia always said if she were to be chosen as Commander, that she would ensure peace between the clans.

Lexa hopes that she would be happy.

In a final act, Lexa kills the Ice Nation guard ( _I will kill who I please)_ , and she banishes Roan, Prince of Azgeda.

* * *

Lexa is almost nineteen, and Costia is not. Costia will never age again. Lexa stays up one night and watches a large object crash onto Earth, and something inside her tells her that this will be her downfall, but she does not yet know what it will be.

Lexa is nineteen, and _Klark Kom Skaikru_ enters her tent.

And now she realises her downfall is nothing but a pretty face, ocean-coloured eyes and sun-coloured hair. Her downfall stares back at her, absorbing tree-coloured eyes and earth-coloured hair.

 _Well, I'm one with the Earth, aren't I?_

* * *

Lexa is still nineteen. Costia would be the same, but she is not here.

But Clarke is.

They stand outside Mount Weather. Clarke's entire world is crashing down around her. It is written all over her face. At first, Lexa thinks that she can bear this. That she can sacrifice _her world_ to save that of others. That is the sacrifice of being Commander. It is a sacrifice that Costia had always tried to prepare her for.

But then Clarke gives her a look, with those haunted eyes of hers.

And suddenly Lexa is fifteen again and she is admitting to Costia that she would sacrifice her if the opportunity ever demanded for it. Costia is turning to leave, but she gives her a look.

It is the same look Clarke gives her now. _The exact same look._ And Lexa realises that is is not mere betrayal, not mere hurt at the loss of what had been. But it is heartbreak, at its rawest form. The kind of primal instinct where a mother will mourn the loss of a dead young, where a fox will never find a new mate if their one has been killed.

Lexa wonders how many more choices like this she will have to make before the fragility that she has tried so hard to hide will shatter her.

* * *

Lexa forces herself back to where she is now, her mind feels lost somewhere in translation, where the bridge between the past and the present collide. Clarke's eyes unblinking and wide, with dark shadows growing heavier by the second.

Lexa doesn't say anything, but her shoulders fall, no longer rigid. She doesn't realise it, but she is shaking. Clarke reaches out and holds her arm and looks her in the eyes.

"Thank you," Clarke whispers quietly.

Lexa nods, she feels numb. She doesn't know what else to do. She is ready to leave. Ready to enter the abyss of darkness that her chamber will so gladly give her.

But Clarke's grip does not waver, she does not let go. So Lexa stays, and she turns and faces Clarke.

Clarke is here. Clarke will age. Clarke is a leader, just like her. Clarke is beginning to understand the weight of her sacrifices, a burden they will always carry. But somehow, something shifts, Lexa's weight to carry is not only her own, Clarke shares it with her. She lightens the load. Cool waves splash against Lexa's mind. It is peaceful, almost eery in the way it calms her and forces her to press forward simultaneously.

Clarke then reaches for Lexa, until their bodies are pressed together. Her forehead is pressed against Clarke's, and their noses brush up against each other. Lexa knows that Clarke will go no further, that she still needs time, and Lexa will never rush her.

They sleep, bodies pressed against each other, intertwined while in deep slumber. Everything could change in the morning, but for now, they are free.

Lexa knows too, that she is in love with her. And perhaps, with the way Clarke looks at her now, maybe, just maybe, Lexa could think the feeling may be mutual.

Green and blue.

Lexa and Clarke.


End file.
